One thing I can appreciate about Southern California culture is how important the coastline is to the locals. Being from the SF Bay Area, while our own respective coastline is an excellent place for photography and bonfires with friends, it is not necessarily the best place to sunbathe, surf, etc. due to the temperature being much colder than SoCal, as well as having microclimates that are notorious for bringing in fog at practically any time of the day, no matter what time of the year. In SoCal, it’s practically law that one should be at the beach on a bright, sunny day – embracing the warmth, playing beach volleyball, or going surfing.

During my three week long training at the Illumina HQ in San Diego, I was only able to make it out to the beach once -- during my first week. Fortunately, I was able to enjoy this outing with my sister, who’s working on finishing up her Bachelor’s in Biochemistry at UCSD, and we were greeted with one of the most beautiful sunsets either of us had seen in quite some time.